All language subtitles for After the Night s01e02_English

- My husband was reading the paper.

He said, "There's been a killing."

I said, "Has there?"

he said, "Yeah."

He said, "I hope they catch
the bugger that did it."

On the 9th of February 1963,

after an argument, my girlfriend
started walking home.

I tried looking for her

but suddenly she was gone.

I was concerned
because there was a killer

out there, shooting people.

This is where I found her

bleeding to death.

- It was a downright bloody lie.

Button was a voice around town
in the criminal element.

That bloke is bloody guilty.

# So you run, run, run

# From everything you are

# And you're lost

# With every scar

# And you say my name
like it's a game

# But you can't hide

# I see you there

# Behind the lies

# You never know the pain

# It comes and goes

# In ways that cannot
be erased

# It only fades away

# Long enough to remember

# The price we paid #

Pass you that one.

Remand for youth,

John Button.

It was a hit and run.

Rosemary was his fiancee.

Terrible.

John Button was responsible.

He was seen to be the guilty one.

Knowing you've got John Button,

you know, we can relax.

- When this charge came out,

the group with whom I associated
said they didn't believe it.

No one is that hot-headed.

- The hit and run
of Rosemary Anderson was awful.

But Button
is an awful piece of work.

Had a shocking temper.

- John was head over heels in love.

He did not do it.

- No, I reckon he's still guilty.

A lot of people think
he's still guilty.

Lots.

- I've heard people say
that he had a temper.

Oh...

No. Not with me.

Over here at the back,
I've got the hit run.

In the front row is Button.

I became involved
in John Button's case

about thirty years
after he was arrested.

Madril confession...

He certainly didn't look
like somebody

who would be capable
of a crime like this,

but I covered police courts
as a cadet journalist.

Hit runs, hit runs.

And I could see that they could look
very nice and sound very nice.

I used my contacts
from my days in government

and was able to get access
to every case file.

The deeper I dug,
the more clear it became

that this was far more complex
than anyone had ever realised.

There was still a lot of division
in the community

as to whether
John was guilty or not,

and none of us had been told
the full truth.

Thank you for coming, everyone,

and it's nice to see
a few friends there.

For those who don't know me,
I grew up in Perth

and on Australia Day, 1963,

there were five shootings in Perth
in one night.

(GUNSHOT)

It set Perth into utter panic.

Everyone was terrified.

(GUNSHOT)

And so was I.

He's got a gun!

(GUNSHOT)

- It completely changed the city.

Then, when the entire police force
was searching for this killer,

just two weeks later

Rosemary Anderson gets run down
by a car as she walks home at night.

And all the evidence points to her
19-year-old boyfriend, John Button.

Police took John
to the main police station in Perth

and detectives took a statement.

- I told them as much as I could.

I started off about telling them
that we'd had an argument.

She'd walked home,

and I'd followed her down

and found her lying
by the side of the road

and rushed her off
to the doctor's surgery.

- But the detectives didn't buy it.

They were the best in the business.

They knew a liar when they saw it.

Stuttering. Stumbling.

He had liar written
all over his face.

But the police,
they don't just go on hunches.

They needed evidence.

- Button's car
was in the Roe Street police yard.

I was called to examine the vehicle
for its mechanical condition.

You judged the vehicle
on its damage,

how it occurred, where it occurs,
points of impact,

stresses and so on.

When I investigated the Simca,

I saw that there was damage
to the front over-rider

on the bumper.

John's car had been involved in
a collision.

- These policemen,

they noticed the front of the car
had been damaged

and they noticed a few drops
of blood on the bonnet of the car.

Also, I had a large amount
of blood on my hands.

I'd actually run into
the back of a car

a fortnight earlier,

and damaged the left-hand grille
and headlight.

But I didn't know
how the blood got there.

But then even more evidence
of Button's guilt.

They found some stockings
and a girdle in the backseat.

Aha! Sex was involved.

They worked it out.

He'd got a bit fresh with her,
maybe a bit of playing around,

but then she said no,
and she went off.

He got angry, stormed after her
and wild at her, he ran her down.

For police, this was proof
that Button was lying.

But they didn't believe my story.

I've never been as upset
in all my life

as I was over this.

But I tried not to think about that.

I was more...

I was more concerned about Rosemary.

All I could think of was her
being hurt.

I didn't want to believe it.

I just wanted to live
in a fantasy world

where it's been a big mistake.

The police were determined
to get the truth out of him,

so they kept interrogating him.

- These policemen turned around
and said,

"Look at the damage to the front
of the car. We know it's you."

"We want a confession."

But then things started getting
a lot worse.

- John Button had been caught,

but there was still a shooter
out there.

(RADIO TUNING)

- A mystery gunman shot two people
dead in Vincent

and Louise Streets, Nedlands.

A third man was critically wounded,

and the gunman fired upon
two other people

sitting in a parked car.

The gunman vanished into the night
as mysteriously as he had arrived.

He left few clues.

We were certainly reporting every
car backfiring.

Every time somebody
knocked at the door

you'd call out, "Who is it?"

Doors stayed locked.

Windows stayed locked.

We didn't sleep outside anymore.

We're a big, suspicious,
scared city.

- We've got to find this person.

Everybody was looking at each other.

- Everybody knew everybody.

And so everybody
suspected everybody.

Life changed completely.

Every police officer was onto it.

- But everything
that they had been doing to date

seemed to have been wasted.

- I think we were losing empathy
with the police,

because they couldn't solve

what should have been
a simple solution.

Probably about 500,000
people lived in Perth at that time

and 500,000 of them
were frightened for their lives.

So they wanted the police to fix it,

and they couldn't.

Oh, huge pressure.

- What's happening?

Murders committed and no one's
being charged with anything.

And this is true.

To the point where
it got to Parliament

that we weren't doing our job.

- Questions were being asked
in Parliament

as to why the FBI wasn't called in.

Scotland Yard should have been
called in to give the local CIB

the assistance it required,
because of ...

there was still no result
from our investigations.

- They then brought over
a New South Wales Detective

and put him on the team.

And we were very unhappy about that.

- That must have been frustrating
for you guys.

Well it was.

Everybody was feeling it.

- And then nothing more happened.

The shooter had gone quiet,

and we'd started to relax slightly.

He hasn't done anything for a while,

so we thought we were OK.

But we weren't.

That was me, hanging out clothes
at the university.

On Australia Day 1963,

well I was in Papua New Guinea

for the holidays,
with my university friend, Shirley.

While we were driving in the car,

over the radio came
the shocking announcement

that people in Perth
had been killed.

And one of them was John Sturkey,
whom we knew.

That was even more horrifying.

We had no idea six months later

Shirley would be shot as well.

Shirley and I, we became friends
in the last year of school

and then went
to university together.

She was quite charismatic

and she was quite ambitious.

I think she wanted to try and rise
above the more working-class family.

We spent a lot of time together
and became really close friends.

After Papua New Guinea,

Shirley and I made our debut
at the Graduation Ball.

That was me, doing the curtsey.

You had to curtsey
to the Chancellor.

The university was very up-market.

We spent a lot of time
going to the coffee shop.

Sometimes going to lectures,

but more often than not, sleeping in
and missing lectures and so on.

But by August holidays,
the place was fairly deserted

and several of the students
would babysit for people

who lived in these posher areas
near the university, in Dalkeith.

So this particular night,

Shirley took the place
of another student who was sick

to babysit for these people
named Dowd.

We were all locking our doors.

One had been left unlocked.

This shooter found it.

(MUSIC PLAYS)

(GUNSHOT)

(RECORD STATIC)

Perth erupts again.

The shooter is still around.

He's still out there,

hunching around houses,
looking for unlocked doors.

Shirley McLeod was babysitting
for Karl and Wendy Dowd.

So I rang Karl Dowd

and I took shorthand notes
of what he told me over the phone.

"I went up the stairs first
and saw her."

"Having seen her,
I raced into the nursery

"and put my back against the door."

"Immediate assumption was
that this guy was still around.

"I just stood there with my back
against the wall going,

'No, no, no.'"

It was a Sunday morning

and there was a loud bang
on my door,

and it was our University warden.

She said, "Oh Shirley's been shot."

I said, "But she's alright,
isn't she?"

She said, "I'm sorry,
but I'm afraid she died."

I, I just was sort of completely
horrified and shocked.

And detectives, they had taken apart
everything in her room.

They had taken all of the books
out of the bookshelves.

Pieces of paper out of
pockets of her clothing.

That was pretty dreadful.

- Perth girl, 18, shot.

Police hunt for maniac. Ohh.

- And the police believe
that the killer could be

the same person who committed
the Nedlands and Cottesloe shootings

six months ago.

Oh, no.

Not another one.

Especially near us again,
close to home.

- Mm.

- It just seemed endless.

It was a shock that you could be
sitting your lounge room.

And the police
were absolutely right.

We were dealing with a maniac.

And everybody was totally at the end
of their tether

when it comes to this.

- Police officers,

they weren't seemingly making
any headway whatsoever

and the nature of the murders
were so brazen,

so outrageous and so different.

- And then, suddenly

there was a major breakthrough
with Shirley McLeod's murder.

For the first time
at a murder scene,

they found a fingerprint.

There'd been no fingerprints
on any of the other murder scenes.

They found one that testing,
checking, showed

didn't belong to the baby's parents,

didn't belong to any visitors,
didn't belong to any tradesmen.

They had a stranger's fingerprint
in this house.

They started fingerprinting
en masse.

- The police were house to house,

door to door,

on residents in the area,

particularly in the areas

where the multiple murders
were committed.

Many, many residents
in the Nedlands, Cottesloe area,

Dalkeith area, were fingerprinted.

It was the biggest door to door
fingerprinting operation

ever in Australia.

The plan was to fingerprint
every male over 12 years old.

It was unprecedented.

- I can still see them the day
they came and fingerprinted me.

Dad set this thing up for them,

then we had two policemen come in.

And Mum made them a cup of tea.

It was still like that.

So they had a cup of tea
while they fingerprinted us.

I thought it was a bit
of an invasion of privacy,

but that had to be set aside
in the better good of everybody.

They fingerprinted

every male student
in the university,

including her brother,

which is shocking really
when you think about it.

She was so close to her brother.

The atmosphere of the western
suburbs suddenly changed.

There was some hope

they might catch this guy
before the next one.

A glimmer of hope.

We had a little tiff.

She ran out of the house.
I went to follow her.

I couldn't find her for ages.

At the police station,

John Button continued to tell them
his version of events.

John told them he drove
under the subway,

and found Rosemary
lying in the sand.

But they had real evidence
against him.

The grille was buckled.
The headlight rim was dented.

And there was blood on the car.

And then,
examining Button's car again,

they found a dent on the bonnet,

a broad, shallow dent
about the size of a head.

Clear evidence that Rosemary's head
had hit the bonnet

before she was flung off
to the side in the sand.

So they kept asking
over and over and over.

- Tell us again.

- And this was this sort
of questioning

that went on and on and on then.

- Again!

Yeah, what happened?

- "Why did you do it?
It must have been you."

"Look at the blood on the car.
Just tell us why."

The police,

they said it could have been
that you just got too close to her.

You could have just meant
to scare her

and made a slip and ran her down.

And I've seen her on the side
of the road, in the sand.

I kept telling them the same story.

And I think she was bleeding.

- "I found her lying
by the side of the road,

"and I took her off
to the doctor's surgery."

And I said no,
that I hadn't done it.

- But the detectives,

they weren't buying it.

They thought he was lying.

So they kept on at him.

They were going to get
the truth out of him.

And that's exactly what they did.

So this document...

..is a confession
that my father signed.

In his words,

"Rosemary was walking on the
left-hand side of the road."

"Before I realised
what had happened,

"I had hit her with
the left-hand side

"of the front of my car."

"I stopped my car and got out."

"I saw Rosemary lying
on the left-hand side of the road,

"level with the front door."

"She had a cut over her right eye
and was bleeding."

"She was unconscious
and not moving."

You know, my questions as I grew up
and asked my Dad, "What'd you do?"

"How could that possibly be?"

"How do you end up
with a signed confession?"

- And then they started
getting physical.

And I remember being punched
a few times.

And it was then that I thought,

well, I wanted to know
how Rosemary was.

I said to them, I said,
"How's Rosemary?"

And they said, "Oh, she's dead."

"She died a couple of hours ago."

At that point, I didn't care
what happened to me.

(KEYS CLACKING)

Said, "You had an argument?"

I said, "Yes."

- You got fresh with her.

I said, "Yes."

"You followed her in the car?"
"Yes."

- You tried to scare her.

- Yes.

And you're there and ran her down.

I said, "Yes."

At that point,
I signed a confession.

- That's a bullshit story.

Anybody likely to believe that?

This is the police
he's talking about.

The police.

The people we trust to protect us.

John, he felt guilty.

He had been lying.

Now he was telling the truth.

He'd signed a confession.

They had their man.

- I know my Dad signed that.

But it's jarring to me.

It doesn't fit,

because I grew up knowing
that my Dad...

..is the softest, most-gentlest man
you could come across.

- He confessed to the murder
of Rosemary Anderson.

He had the argument with the girl

and then there was a hit and run.

- If someone was to say,
"Oh, Button had a real temper."

I never saw that. Ever.

- I was charged with wilful murder.

I was sent down to Fremantle Prison.

It was my nineteenth birthday.

- For the next week after
Shirley McLeod's murder,

the police were still in the middle
of a huge fingerprinting operation.

In the end, they collected
8,000 fingerprints,

but they did not get a match.

But then there was another
major breakthrough

on the other side of the river.

Right over in Mount Pleasant
in the south of Perth.

Hidden away,

under a Geraldton wax bush.

They had found a rifle
under this sprig of Geraldton wax.

It's pretty well right here.

Four or five yards
from my bedroom window.

The couple were walking by.

The lady decided she wanted to pick
a piece of Geraldton wax

which had these nice
little flowers on the end.

As she went to pick them,

she's noticed the rifle
on the ground.

When I found out that rifle
was right outside my bedroom window,

I was petrified.

I've got a shivery feeling
just thinking about it.

They called the police.

- We took the rifle in
to the ballistics people

and it was then ascertained
that this was the rifle used

to shoot the latest victim,

the girl Shirley McLeod.

What we did,

we took another rifle back
and wired it into this bush.

- So they put up a lookout for us.

- And then we kept a 24-hour vigil

in a camouflaged tent,

wearing camouflaged clothing,

changing staff at midnight

so that nobody knew of the presence
of the detectives in that area.

(THUNDER)

They were there for seventeen days
and seventeen nights

in one of the worst winters
we ever had.

- But nobody went back
to retrieve it.

They waited two weeks,
but nothing happened.

So the police came up with a plan
to draw out the killer.

- How could we get the perpetrator
back to the bush?

So we decided on a ruse
whereby it was decided

that insertion
in the local Daily News.

- The truth is,

the CIB called in myself,
as the Daily News crime reporter,

and told us they'd found the rifle.

So we were more or less given
a carte blanche

to write anything we liked,

with the hope of attracting
the killer back for the weapon.

And we fed out such stories
to the effect

that fingerprinting
was being conducted

in the Mount Pleasant area.

Just try and entice whoever it was

to come back for it.

- It must have been a very hard
job for the police,

because it was a cold winter.

It was cold and wet and rainy

and still not knowing, will this
killer come back for his rifle?

Two weeks later,

half past one in the morning,

just as the streetlights went out,

Bill Hawker, who was on guard,

saw a car pull up opposite the bush.

Because it was so steep,

they could only see the top
of the car.

- But they had to wait and see
if he'd come to get the gun.

Perth is waiting for this.

The police reputation
is hanging on this.

It must have been a very difficult
time for those police officers.

If we miss, and he's got a rifle
and sees us up here ...

- The lookout,

two 15-stone blokes ran down.

And we got the bastard.

The perpetrator
is taken in for questioning.

They've got him.

- They'd got him.
- They got him.

- Oh, at last.
- Yes.

Got him.

Bastard!

- The police were extraordinary.

When anybody mentions
a Geraldton wax bush today,

you think of that rifle.

Finally, the police had the shooter
of Shirley McLeod.

He was small
and he was mumbling something.

They actually thought
they had a wild animal,

because his hands didn't feel human.

But he was wearing kid gloves.

He always did that to avoid
fingerprints.

The detectives
in the CIB Headquarters in Perth

take a statement.

But this man kept denying anything.

They had him going for the rifle,

but he said he had just been going
to urinate there one day previously

and had seen it
and was coming back to get it

for the fun of it.

He denied everything.

But then they found
a .22 rifle cartridge in his car.

That cartridge was tested
and proved to be

a cartridge from the rifle
that had been used to kill

Shirley McLeod.

They had their man.

- After they charged me,

because I was charged
with wilful murder,

I was put in solitary confinement
on death row before my trial.

Death row down at Fremantle Prison

consisted of about seven
or eight cells

that were wired off from the rest
of the prison.

There'd be a mattress on the floor,

there'd be a plastic bucket
in the corner.

I did hear in prison the killer came
to retrieve his rifle,

but I didn't believe it.

I thought they'd been out
looking for this killer.

They were after a crime to solve.

They just had to find someone
to pin this crime on.

- Button was on death row,
pleading his innocence.

Wow.

Guilty people in prison
are always pleading their innocence.

But Button's parents believed him.

Now, they needed
the best lawyer in Perth.

We're looking at a portrait
of my father, Ken Hatfield.

My father was
a top criminal lawyer and a QC.

He was one of the best.

A man with great morals
and great integrity.

The phone would ring at 3am.

He would get up.

A taxi would pick him up at 4am

and he would go straight
to the office

so that he could work

without telephones
and people interrupting him,

before he had to go to court.

If you had him for a lawyer,

you would be a very lucky man.

The Button family contacted
my father.

So he went to visit Button
in prison.

My father said, "You tell me
the truth and I can help you."

- He said, "John, why did you sign
that confession?"

And he said, "John, did you do it?"

And I said, "No,
but it was my fault."

- My father didn't really know,
you know, what he believed.

I think you always think
you can trust the police, don't you?

My father thought
that John would lose

because he signed a confession.

But my father loved a challenge.

- Ken Hatfield had a real record
for getting his clients acquitted.

Button's family,

they mortgaged their house
to pay for him,

but that gave them some hope.

At the trial,

the biggest thing that his defence
had to deal with,

of course, was the confession.

That was going to be the problem,

because people didn't believe that
the police would do anything wrong.

(GAVEL KNOCKING)

So Ken Hatfield tried desperately
to have John's confession

excluded from the trial.

He ran a voir dire, a whole day
of argument before the judge,

with the jury absent,

to explain they'd hounded him,
they'd gone on and on,

and that confession
wasn't given voluntarily.

It certainly didn't mention
any violence,

but it was the detectives going on
and on and on at John.

Not letting him off.

"Come on, come on,
tell us the truth."

"You did it, didn't you?
You killed her, didn't you?"

And he was trying
to get the judge to believe

that it wasn't given voluntarily,

therefore it should be excluded
from the trial.

Despite him presenting this,

the judge said he was convinced

that there was no impropriety
on behalf of the police

in getting this confession
from Button.

- My lawyer said, "The confession,

"That's the best evidence
they've got against you."

He said, "I won't ask you
the question in court,

"have the police beaten you up
or not, but if it does come up,

"think very carefully
about what answer you give."

They don't believe the police were
beating me up,

"They mightn't believe you on
anything, and they could hang you."

Consequently in court,
the question did come up.

The prosecutor asked me if I'd ...

..that there'd been physical abuse.

Now I didn't want to call
the police liars

by saying they had been
beating me up.

And after thinking
for a few seconds,

I had to say no.

- And then in the trial,
the prosecutor asked Button,

"How did that dent in the bonnet
get there?"

You can just see it there,

or a ripple, buckled slightly.

- I told them I didn't know

what had happened to the bonnet
of the car.

- And he just said,
"I wouldn't like to say."

And that was it.

You know, that was it.

"I wouldn't like to say."

Now that doesn't go down well,
does it?

"I wouldn't like to say," to me,

means you're guilty.

It got there
and I'm not going to tell you.

(GAVEL KNOCK)

- After that, my father thought
he was going to lose the case.

He was very concerned.

- The trial lasted all week
into Saturday,

and at the end, the jury deliberated
for three-and-a-half hours.

I didn't know what to think,

whether I'd be found guilty
or not guilty.

To get convicted, I could be hanged.

- For the jury,
it ultimately came down to,

"Do you believe the police,

"or do you believe
a stuttering teenager?"

They came to a decision.

- I was up in the dock.

I was trying very hard
to hold myself together,

when the jury came back
with the verdict.

(GAVEL KNOCKS)

(TAPE RECORDING PLAYS)

- Would you ask the witness
to come into the box, Mr Hatfield?

- Members of the jury,

have you agreed to come
to a verdict?

- We have, Your Honour.

- How say you?

John Button, guilty or not guilty?

Not guilty, Your Honour.

Bart Kakulis, who was sitting
with my father said,

"Thank Christ."

"Not guilty, Your Honour."

My emotions shot right up.

I, I just felt this great big load

had suddenly been lifted off

and I was free.

I felt a bit like a bird.

I was able just to fly out of there.

I was free. It was all over.

I just couldn't believe it.

I looked out the back of me,
to the door, and thought,

"Could they stop me if I hopped out
of the dock and just ran outside?"

- I'm sorry, sir,
I said the wrong thing there.

- But then suddenly, the foreman
turned around and said,

"Sorry, Your Honour, I made
a mistake there."

- I must apologise, Your Honour.

Read that again to me, please.

- How say you, John Button,
guilty or not guilty?

- Guilty, Your Honour.

(TAPE STOPS)

Mm.

I looked at my lawyer
and he's just sat there

and I couldn't believe it.

My mind was just screaming out,

"Don't sit there. Do something."

"Say something."

"Surely this can't be allowed
to happen."

But he did nothing.

- And the Justice had to say,
"Guilty to what?"

because it could have been wilful
murder, murder or manslaughter.

"Manslaughter, Your Honour."

Manslaughter.

It was terrible.

It was devastating for all of them.

What a lot of crap, you know.

And a mob of bastards, you know.

And saying it's a lot of bullshit.

Sunday Times, the next day,
in the morning,

'Jury Returns Manslaughter
Verdict In Car Case'

and they run a photo there

of John's father thanking
his lawyers.

And he must have been heartbroken.

- I went out to get the paper.

I threw the paper
onto my father's bed

and said, "Well that's one case
you didn't win."

And he said,
"It's one bastard I should have."

"That boy is innocent."

I think everyone was quite happy.

He was found guilty.

- The relief was amazing.

- Knowing they've got their man,

John Button.

Intense relief.

- We were watching it,
and my husband says,

"This boy says he's not guilty."

And I said, "Well, do you reckon
he is guilty, Eric?"

"What do you think?"

And he said,

"Well if he's not guilty,
he's no need to worry,

"'cause they're bound to catch
the killer sooner or later."

"He'll confess and they'll
release him."

- I was sentenced
to ten years hard labour.

Hey Dad, so this is
your old workshop.

- We all had a toolbox like that.

We used to make cupboards
for the government.

- I didn't know that.

The worst part of prison
is the nights.

During the day,
you can keep yourself busy.

But at night,

the lights are turned out at 8pm

and you've got nothing left to do.

- This is my Dad's prison cell.

F52, Fremantle Prison.

This is where he spent...

..his sentence.

I never realised
what it might be like for him

to be on this side of it,

with no capacity or freedom
to let himself out.

I just wanted to live in
a fantasy world

where it's been a big mistake.

You get more and more emotional
until finally hours later,

you'd throw yourself on the bed,
crying your eyes out.

This was basically every night.

It would ... would get to you.

One of the memories
I know so well as a child

is my father's pacing.

Even when he's...

..distressed, or stressed

or distracted as an adult,

he paces.

And he paces exactly four paces

the size of his cell,

and he still does that now.

And I grew up watching my Dad

with his fists clenched
by his side, pacing.

I realised the demons
that keep him awake at night.

- I never got over it.

- You know, why does he still feel

he can't get over it?

Why is he tormented?

Because he's guilty.

I've never thought
he was innocent, ever.

- The police had the shooter
of Shirley McLeod.

It was a man the police knew
as a petty thief.

A small man with a disability,
cleft palate, cleft lip.

A family man, seven children,
from South Perth.

Eric Edgar Cooke.

My husband.

Oh, dear.

It was Father's Day.

The kids were all babies.

They all ran to the door
with presents for Dad

because they thought it was Dad
coming home.

He'd been out all night,
which wasn't...

unusual.

But there's Mr Nielsen.

I said, "Oh, hello."

"What have you got him
for this time?'

because he was always
getting arrested.

"Loitering or stealing?" He said,

"Far worse than that, Mrs Cooke."

- Bill Neilsen came in
with Mrs Cooke

and she called out,
"What are they doing to you?"

And he said, "Oh, they're saying
they're trying to tell you

"that I'm the bloke
they're looking for."

I didn't believe it was him.

I said, "You might have got him
for loitering,

"but you're telling me
you got him for murder?"

And they said, "Yes,
and he's confessed to it."

And I said, "Oh,
you're telling lies."

"You're just trying to make a big
fella of yourself."

But I said, "Cookie,
you tell your wife the truth."

Well I said, "It's not true,
is it, Eric?"

And she said, "Eric,
what is the truth?"

"What, what have you been doing?"

I said to Eric, "I don't believe
the police."

He said, "They don't lie."

He said, "The police
never lie, Sally."

He said, 'It's true.'

And he said, "Oh yes, darling,
I'm the man they're looking for."

Well I knew he was a thief

and a womaniser,

but that's far different
to being a murderer.

And he said,

"It's a good job you caught me

"without me knowing
I was being caught,

"'cause I had enough bullets
and a rifle up in my ceiling

"to do away with my family
and then myself."

And that's what he had in mind.

And the police said,
"You'd kill your little children?"

"Well I wasn't going to leave them
behind for anybody else."

And they got the gun
out of the ceiling.

He wasn't telling lies.

- And then what'd you do?

Well I had seven kids.

No money. Just a pension.

Rented house.

So...

I had sisters, wouldn't come
near me because of the scandal

and my sister said,
"Well, you move away from here."

"Go to another state.
Change your name."

She said, "Well you won't be
seeing me with my daughter."

"This name's not going to rub
off on here."

And I...

well I didn't know what to do.

- The police had John Button
for the murder of Rosemary Anderson.

They had Eric Edgar Cooke
for the murder of Shirley McLeod.

But although we in the community
were relieved,

we weren't really relaxed.

Police suspected Cooke

might also be responsible
for the Australia Day murders.

(GUNSHOT)

There were similarities between
all the shootings.

The same type of rifle was used

and all the victims had been shot
in the head.

So they took Cooke to the locations
of all the Australia Day shootings,

to see if he might confess.

He took them around.

He went from house to house to house

but he only told them
about minor crimes.

He would take them to a house

and say
where he'd stolen money from,

what sort of dogs they had,
the decor of the house.

Even what whisky decanters
he'd taken a swig from.

But he couldn't
or wouldn't talk to them.

Nope.

You can't do much about it.

- Then, there was another
completely unexpected turn.

Cooke confessed to running down
Rosemary Anderson.

- I got the news in prison.

I was sitting there,
stuck to the wireless.

(RADIO TUNING)

NEWSMAN: The cruel killer,

he confessed to being
a hit and run maniac

in a stolen car.

- Eric Edgar Cooke

confessed to running down Rosemary.

I couldn't believe it.

He did the right thing
and came out with the truth.

I thought straight away,

"I'm out of here, if somebody's come
and confessed."

I was just basically waiting
for someone to come and release me.

But they didn't.

Life just got worse
instead of better.

(MUSIC)

- He was driving around, looking
for someone to kill that night.

I got to about here
when I heard the car rev up.

I kept screaming
that he was coming for me.

- Until he is hung,
the book can't be closed.

- This is the time
to clear my Dad's name.

- Belief is not proof.

They were going to show

whether John was a liar
and a killer,

or whether he was totally innocent.

Prisons are full of people
who never did it.

I opened the door
and down on the grass was a body.

I just thought, "She's dead."

And now we've got a strangler.